With clause 10, Chair, what this bill finally does for Canadians is allow full transparency and accountability when it comes to climate change targets. Mr. Layton's bill sets into law those targets and timelines, finally. Clause 10 is very clear, and we've made appropriate amendments to it to allow Canadians to first of all know what the government's commitment is currently and what it will be for the next phase, and then to have the government account for what they've done to that point: what has been effective and what has not worked.
We have moved amendments to allow that the national round table engage on this and that the Commissioner of the Environment also be able to properly audit the government's work, its successes and its failures. Finally, with a bill like this and a section included in it like this, Canadians can feel some reassurance that the government's words might actually meet their actions for once on climate change. It is fully accountable and transparent.
Juxtapose this with the government's actions of the last number of days. My plea, my encouragement to government members is to allow this bill to receive the democratic approval that it is being given, in the way that this place functions and operates as the House that Canadians built for us. They may not like it; they not appreciate how the numbers work out, or that their entire agenda doesn't get through. Such is life. But to stall day after day, to come in here hour after hour wasting tax dollars, wasting the time of the environment committee, and preventing us from getting to anything else on our agenda....
Mr. Godfrey has a bill. I know, Chair, you have some things that you would like to study and look at before the summer break. If it's the government's plan to waste the next 30 days until this bill must be reported back to Parliament, I see no logic in the strategy—never mind morally and ethically, but even politically—of continuing the stall.
I have taken four minutes this afternoon to explain what the clause is so that it's in more understandable terms than what is written—legislation is always in need of some interpretation. I defend it because of the reason why I think it's important, and then I'm prepared to move on to accept the vote of this committee. If they choose to vote down clause 10, then so be it; that is the democratic will. But we cannot continue to waste time. We cannot continue to allow Canadians to see this circus that the government continues day after day and pretend that this is somehow effective governance. It's not. It's morally reprehensible on an issue like climate change to delay it again.
Clause 10, to be clear, is an accountability and transparency clause. It allows us all to understand what we're talking about. It allows people to measure government effectiveness or ineffectiveness. This is what this clause allows.
If the government wishes to vote against accountability, then so be it. Allow them to show their votes, but not the continued inappropriate and misguided tactic of stalling, delaying, and not allowing the will of Parliament to see it. I can remember that the current Prime Minister, when he was Leader of the Opposition, talked often about the will of Parliament. That is what we are trying to express here.
I encourage government members to stop the suppression that stops the will of the House from moving forward and our getting something Canadians can be proud of, that we can all be proud of as committee members, and so start to work together again. There's something Canadians are needing, and that is solutions. They don't need these political fights; they want solutions. This is a proposed solution.
The government can disagree with it; the government can have problems with it. But ultimately the government should have the courage to either vote with it or against it. This cowardly tactic of delaying day after day does nothing for anybody. It's time that we get back to the work this committee is charged with doing on behalf of this place and see this bill through.
That's all.